XWord Muggles Forum

I was unable to solve this one even with some pointers. Very frustrating!!! I have to learn to just say "oh, well". Try again next week.

Amazing what a good night’s sleep will do. I got up this morning and looked at the puzzle for the 600th time I am sure. The lack of three letter words with YE in them made me certain that my search to “find another word like that in the grid” was a fruitless pursuit.

I had been collaborating and one of my messages to my collaborator was “letters to some to get new words (EYE,ALIVE, GRANGE, SPIN, EBONY)” and suddenly I thought “wonder if they are colors”? So let’s see OLIVE, ORANGE PINK, EBONY oh and TEAL, LILAC, PEAR…yeah I am onto something here, what can I do with YE? I can make YELLOW but that is many letters, darn.

So what letters do I have ?OO??KCLER – well I don’t know any animals with that name although it resembles WOODPECKER. BRIGHT LIGHT!!!! Those aren’t colors they are TREES and it isn’t YELLOW (one of my thoughts) it is a crossword favorite YEW. It wasn’t hard then to backsolve for the other letters.

Then as if a sign from the heavens the Pileated woodpecker that visits a big PINE out back started a rat-tat-tat. So, I didn’t even need a confirmation from Matt, I got it from Woody and I also got the message that I am going to have to have someone look at that tree because it is no doubt infested and perhaps weakened. Large weakened pines behind your house in the hurricane and lightning capital of the USA are NOT a good idea.

Nudged into the tractor beams at the eleventh hour by a helpful creature

Actually, I HAD the right idea for several days. But it was being drowned out by the big fat RED HERRING (hmmm, another 10-letter creature) at the literal 2-down ARARAT (more commonly clued as the landing site of Noah's ark) and the corresponding 57d clue CATS AND RATS which conveniently is part of the lyrics to the Irish Rovers song THE UNICORN (hmmm, the full title is yet another 10-letter creature). And lord I'm so forlorn, that song has been in my brain ALL WEEKEND!! But I could not think of any way to TAKE IT FROM THE TOP.

I noticed the 10 2-word down entries. And even tried adding letters to the beginnings of the words, finding O-LIVE, O-RANGE, and E-BONY. I also thought it odd that the only word I could come up with for LILA was LILA-C, which put the letter on the end. I thought - hmmm, those are colors. But was being quite a BLOCKHEAD about seeing the trees for the colors. To boot, I had switched the order of PIN and POLAR in the worksheet I was using, and never went back to my grid to confirm that I had everything right.

At the eleventh hour, I asked a friendly muggle who had already solved to confirm or deny my rabbit holes. I figured if I was way off course, I'd throw in the towel and take the loss. But I was sure one of those paths was probably right, and it would kill me to come REALLY CLOSE to the answer and miss it. So with a proper whack in the head with a 2 by 4 to correct my mistake and disillusion me of the ARARAT misdirect, I got it.

Amusingly enough, had guessed WOODPECKER based on the partials before I found the complete mechanism. And then finally - TREES!!

Very clever meta. TOO clever. And you'll never convince me that ARARAT at TWO-DOWN was a coincidence.

Domini wrote: ↑Tue Apr 27, 2021 11:13 am I’m completely at sea … rabbit holes a plenty but nothing that actually makes any sense. I’m at peace with losing my 25ish puzzle streak, and I don’t want a nudge as I prefer the kind where someone confirms whether I’m on the right track and I am on no track at all…. But if there’s someone equally lost that would like to trade last minute ideas to see if we can spark something, I’d be open to that

Closer than I thought, but this was completely out of my knowledge base. I know next to nothing about trees definitely didn’t know olive and lilac were trees and have never heard of linden. But I did think that the ten two-word down answers were the themes, but I was so focused on putting letters at the starts of the words (that were taken “from the top”), that nothing gave me a toe hold.

I was also much too focused on 2D (ARARAT) and the fact that 86A was ARAp and 53A was RApT…. Both with an added P. And that 69A (LAILA) was LILA + A, and that her last name was also in the grid (5D ALI). But none of this made a coherent theme…

Alas, back to 0 and more heartache next week! Boy I love these things!!!

LOL ... I didn't submit, but my two Hail Mary ideas were going to be:

CHUPACABRA
CHESHIRE CAT



... we're all mad here ...

KayW wrote: ↑Tue Apr 27, 2021 12:39 pm I noticed the 10 2-word down entries. And even tried adding letters to the beginnings of the words, finding O-LIVE, O-RANGE, and E-BONY.

I woke up at 4 a.m. this morning, thought of those three, but then I couldn't see how any of the other theme entries that I could remember could be colorized by putting a letter at the top, and I went back to sleep. I had taken Matt's clue for TOP-- "Take it from the ___ (what our creature might say" -- to mean that a letter had been taken from the top of the entry. It turns out to have meant from the top word. With a bit of an assisti, I finally saw the trees.

I was humbled by this puzzle! Yes I too awoke in the wee hours thinking about it.

And to think I found so many of the words (lilac, orange, ebony, et al) combined with the fact that I recently read "Overstory" AND was just a few days ago discussing a noisy woodpecker with my neighbor - despite all of this the solution eluded me!

Hats off to all who were successful this week.

Bonnibel wrote: ↑Tue Apr 27, 2021 1:36 pm I was humbled by this puzzle! Yes I too awoke in the wee hours thinking about it.

And to think I found so many of the words (lilac, orange, ebony, et al) combined with the fact that I recently read "Overstory" AND was just a few days ago discussing a noisy woodpecker with my neighbor - despite all of this the solution eluded me!

Hats off to all who were successful this week.

Overstory has some great moments; I call it a 300-page masterpiece...in a 500-page book lol.

I feel that those got the meta could say to those who didn't...<Woody>Ha-huh-huh-HA-HA, Ha-huh-huh-HA-HA</Woody>.

Argh, I didn't get it but great concept. Wish I had!

I only was able to solve this puzzle with the help of maybe 5 different people sending me messages and working through different ideas. And then some heavy nudges at the end. I felt like this puzzle had some devious rabbit holes. I was really distracted by "take it form the top" but it feels to me that almost had nothing to do with the puzzle.

camandsampowercouple wrote: ↑Tue Apr 27, 2021 4:37 pm I felt like this puzzle had some devious rabbit holes. I was really distracted by "take it form the top" but it feels to me that almost had nothing to do with the puzzle.

That took me out as well. Got hung up on "take it from the top" with PERFORMANCE, which was the central long across entry. I figured that HAD to be relevant. The phrase in question specifically (or, at least originally) relates to performances.

KayW wrote: ↑Tue Apr 27, 2021 12:39 pm Actually, I HAD the right idea for several days. But it was being drowned out by the big fat RED HERRING (hmmm, another 10-letter creature) at the literal 2-down ARARAT (more commonly clued as the landing site of Noah's ark)

I had that RED HERRING guess ready to go too, because I was SURE that ARARAT was a an intentional one ( “animals,” and “two” in the title? C’mon.).

Same stuck-ness as many on the colors colors colors... the tree theme came just by persisting, thanks to a couple nudgers who said “keep looking; you’re on the right track.”

I never solved this one. Saw the add-a-letter on O-Live and O-Range but didn’t see any other ‘add letters to make a color’ and then, like Joequavis, was hung up with trying to tie in PERFORMANCE to the meta. Back to week 1 next week.

JennyByrd wrote: ↑Tue Apr 27, 2021 10:29 pm I never solved this one. Saw the add-a-letter on O-Live and O-Range but didn’t see any other ‘add letters to make a color’ and then, like Joequavis, was hung up with trying to tie in PERFORMANCE to the meta. Back to week 1 next week.

Hate to be the one to tell you, but it's week 5 coming up. Hold onto your hats!

I'm also in the failed landing party that only tried adding letters to the top of the 2-word entries, not in the middle of the top word and saw olive and orange but thought colors, not trees.

Very nice puzzle though. Congrats to all who solved it.

I've only skimmed the discussion here, so this may have already been covered. Anyway ...

For a little while, I had the idea that maybe that the creature was to "take IT from the top" -- as in the letters I and T. So that gave me YETI ... but nothing else. While googling, I did, though, learn some about the wonderful world of magical creatures.

The rest of my looooooooong solution gestation period mostly consisted of staring, getting a nudge that kept me focused on the two-letter down entries(I selected "group solve"), and scratching my head in bewilerment.

The tree thing came to me in a flash. I believe it was suddenly seeing the YEW possibility, then suddenly thinking that, yes, I had earlier contemplated LILAC and ORANGE (though not at one time). Then, of course, the puzzle's verticality and what a woodpecker does quickly brought it all together..

joequavis wrote: ↑Tue Apr 27, 2021 4:58 pm

camandsampowercouple wrote: ↑Tue Apr 27, 2021 4:37 pm I felt like this puzzle had some devious rabbit holes. I was really distracted by "take it form the top" but it feels to me that almost had nothing to do with the puzzle.

That took me out as well. Got hung up on "take it from the top" with PERFORMANCE, which was the central long across entry. I figured that HAD to be relevant. The phrase in question specifically (or, at least originally) relates to performances.

One thing that's a delicate balance for me is wondering about the relevance of seemingly longer answers. I got burned a few weeks ago on ZAIRE with the entry of ALICEADAMS - and I forget what the paired one was, but that was one of the two longer ones, so I'm like, "Of course, it's relevant" - then when it wasn't at all, that made me rethink things. But here, I did the same things for the downs; I saw the three that started with "LI-" but figured that couldn't matter! It didn't, at least indirectly, but...well, it did, haha.

I don't know if it was intentional, but that nice long block design at the top (and then, by extension, at the bottom) had a "tree"-shape, so that was cool too.

JennyByrd wrote: ↑Tue Apr 27, 2021 10:29 pm I never solved this one. Saw the add-a-letter on O-Live and O-Range but didn’t see any other ‘add letters to make a color’ and then, like Joequavis, was hung up with trying to tie in PERFORMANCE to the meta. Back to week 1 next week.

Actually this Friday is still April....so a Week 5 puzzle might be on offer.
Unless the drop to 181 solves after 750- > 569 > 567 the first three weeks is a bit much and Matt eases off the gas pedal out of sympathy?

MajordomoTom wrote: ↑Tue Apr 27, 2021 12:53 pm LOL ... I didn't submit, but my two Hail Mary ideas were going to be:

CHUPACABRA
CHESHIRE CAT



... we're all mad here ...

I submitted with nudges, but before that Chupacabra was on my list!